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Avoid Taking Actions Personally

Avoid Taking Actions Personally

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Taking actions personally means placing too much emphasis on another’s words or behaviors. The hurt you experience makes it easier to become offended. Taking actions personally means that you are allowing another’s behavior to get to you. Their words become harmful to you. Taking actions personally means you feel invalidated. To be invalid means to be wrong or weak.

It’s possible to be wrong in a factual way. I thought it was too hot outside, but you are right, it’s actually pleasant. Even though being wrong in this way can be hard for some people, it doesn’t usually result in becoming offended. It’s also possible to feel wrong in a personal way. I failed to recognize my daughter is sad; I am defective. That feeling of being defective is shame. It cuts to the core. It is a state of not feeling accepted or wanted for who you are.

Taking Actions Personally Creates Rejection

Rejection isn’t fun. It can be quite disorienting and debilitating. It can cause self-doubt to fester. Without the internal strength to discount negative, painful messages, people can become defensive. Being defensive means attempting to manage the pain through some form of counter-attack or deflection. I don’t know how to defend against this, so I will go on the offensive to shift the focus away from me. While you can see that defensiveness has a purpose (to protect), it, unfortunately, often ends up inflaming an already tense situation.

Taking Actions Personally Increases Conflict

How can someone else’s struggle give life to (trigger) your personal struggle? It happens when you allow another’s words to become an offense. To work through conflict, it’s important to see clearly how this happens. The focus shifts from another’s problem to your problem. Instead of one wounded person, there are now two. Two upset people dramatically increase the likelihood of an unhealthy argument.

A wounded person feels threatened. There is danger. The greater the threat, the more resilience is needed to prevent a deeper wound. The less confidence people feel in dealing with an attack, the greater their sense of desperation. People in great distress will more likely act impulsively. They might subconsciously hold to it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Taking Actions Personally Reveals Vulnerability

It can be a tactic to expose people and use what is learned against them. This can quickly become a self-fulfilling prophecy. The more offensive a message, the more energy is needed to resist it. The more defensive energy put into resisting, the more the energy is directed back to the other.

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. The tongue of the wise adorns knowledge, but the mouth of the fool gushes folly. The soothing tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit.

Proverbs 15:1,2,4 NIV

Hatred stirs up quarrels, but love makes up for all offenses.

Proverbs 10:12 NLT

The opposite of offended is validated. Instead of giving others what they don’t need (destructive words), try giving others what they do need. Instead of returning rejection with more rejection, offer acceptance. This doesn’t mean letting someone walk all over you or take advantage of you. You should maintain healthy boundaries at all times. However, it’s possible to have boundaries and offer words that bring healing instead of harm.

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

The words of the reckless pierce like swords, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.

Proverbs 4:23, 12:18 NIV

When tempted to take actions personally, consider your need for validation. God is the richest source of validation. What He says about you matters more than anyone else. When you are triggered, seek Him with all your heart so you can experience true security. God’s love for you is immovable, constant, permanent.

Learn more about conflict resolution.
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Play Is Essential To Being Your Best

Play Is Essential To Being Your Best

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Reading time: 3 minutes

When you rake leaves in your yard, is it fun or work? Your answer probably depends on your purpose. Your goal might be to play in the leaves. Or, it might be to make your yard look presentable when you’d rather be doing something more fun.

Children will spend hours raking leaves when they see it as fun. But tell them it’s a chore they have to do, and they’ll spend hours moving slowly and complaining about the job.

What is Play?

Play is a time-out from reality in order to better understand reality. Click To Tweet

In his classic book Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga defined play as “a free activity standing quite consciously outside ‘ordinary’ life as being ‘not serious,’ but at the same time absorbing the player intensely and utterly. It is an activity connected with no material interest, and no profit can be gained by it. It proceeds within its own proper boundaries of time and space according to fixed rules and in an orderly manner.”

Play can be work you enjoy; if it becomes drudgery, it has become something else. Play is relaxing; if it becomes stressful, it has become something else. People choose to play; if it is forced, it has become something else. Play is a glimpse of heaven. If it involves sin (missing God’s ideal), it has become something else.

Play is Related to Purpose and Rest

Play is important because it allows you to connect with the reason God created you. Kids use their imagination to re-create (recreate, grow, build) their understanding of God, self, and life. Forgetting how to have fun is never a good thing. Perhaps the Sabbath is meant to be a time to have fun instead of working so hard.

If your life is all about work, you’ll see yourself as an object that others use. You lose your value. You believe what you want is irrelevant. With a worldview like this, you become only a shell of a person. You can become so focused on tasks that you no longer feel like a person.

One of my favorite things to do is install insulation in a hot attic. Just kidding! I’ve taken on this task a couple of times and it always triggers the thought, this must be what hell feels like. Isolation from people. Irritation from glass fibers. Extreme heat. Maybe insulating is better as a non-summer activity? I’d rather be raking leaves.

When work becomes the priority in life, you’ll lose touch with your true purpose and you’ll become depressed. That’s because you’re made for more than being a machine. Machines don’t have feelings; they tolerate meaningless repetition.

God made you to have fun. He made you to experience joy.

Different people will define “fun” differently. What is work to one, will be fun to another. There will even be different times when what was once work is play, or what was once play is work.

How Much Fun Are You (Having)?

Could you be experiencing depression or anxiety because you have a faulty view of life that emphasizes work over play? Maybe you didn’t become this way on purpose, but your life has changed slowly and now you’ve forgotten how to have fun.

Do a quick check of your current lifestyle.

How much of your life is work and how much is fun?
Has your “fun” turned into a chore?
When was the last time you let loose with an all-out belly laugh?
When was the last time you chose to be more extravagant than efficient?
What are you afraid will happen if you pursue more fun in your life?

Heaven is going to be like work that feels like play, not play that feels like work. Click To Tweet

With the right motivation, your work will honor God, but God also taught His people to have times of celebration and rest. See Luke 15:23-24 and Psalm 118:24.

So this week, will you be intentional about truly playing? Set some time aside for this ultimate way to enter God’s rest. You can’t reach God’s purpose for your life without play.

Read about desire fulfillment.
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Last updated June 25, 2023

Authentic Sharing Leaves People Blessed

Authentic Sharing Leaves People Blessed

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Reading time: 4 minutes

We thrive when God shares His life with us through Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Sharing your life with others might be the best way to encourage someone. Paul describes his desire for mutual edification to the believers in Rome:

One of the things I always pray for is the opportunity, God willing, to come at last to see you. For I long to visit you so I can bring you some spiritual gift that will help you grow strong in the Lord. When we get together, I want to encourage you in your faith, but I also want to be encouraged by yours.

Romans 1:10-12 NLT

A testimony is a statement of personal experience. It can’t be refuted, but it is also hard to deny. Testimonies are usually intentional and planned, but casual sharing can be just as effective.

Sharing Your Spirit is a Blessing

Others need your perspective. It can be incredibly encouraging just to hear someone else acknowledge God’s truth as real. God gives us life to share with others. What is more precious than life? Sharing your life is like a supercharged spiritual discipline.

Because we are made in God’s image, we are spirit at our core too. God made us to have some control over what we keep hidden and what we reveal.

For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.

John 4:24 NLT

If God invests in revealing who He is to us, we should also spend time revealing ourselves to each other. By sharing ourselves we are also revealing who God is because God lives within us. This kind of spiritual sharing goes beyond sharing physical resources.

God’s Spirit has shown you everything. His Spirit finds out everything, even what is deep in the mind of God.

1 Corinthians 2:10 CEV

To see and know God is eternal life (John 17:3).

Mutual Sharing is Superior

What is motivating you when you share? Interestingly enough, sharing benefits both the speaker and the listener. In most relationships, balanced sharing is more rewarding. Listening can be work but it can also be an act of receiving a blessing. Speaking can be work, for example when someone is teaching, but it can also be advantageous.

The speaker is blessed by knowing that what is shared makes a difference in someone else’s life. Sharing is also important for another more subtle reason: not sharing is unnatural. An example of this is when someone gives another the silent treatment. People become emotionally sick when they cannot share their lives with others.

Even though sharing is beneficial, this doesn’t mean it is healthy to share indiscriminately. Even God reveals Himself only to specific people.

My Father has entrusted everything to me. No one truly knows the Son except the Father, and no one truly knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.

Luke 10:22 NLT

Some people have no interest or use for God’s words. They do not understand. They do not know eternal life. God says that you don’t have to waste your time with these people. But there are plenty of others who are poor in spirit. They want to hear the words of truth. They are hungry for the life you have flowing within you.

Don’t give to dogs what belongs to God. They will only turn and attack you. Don’t throw pearls down in front of pigs. They will trample all over them.

Matthew 7:6 CEV

Too often people are taught to not be selfish and to listen more than speak. But if everyone followed this advice, no one would be talking! I encourage you to intentionally seek a balance in your relationships. Both speaking and listening are powerful blessings.

When you speak, be deliberate about sharing the best parts of your spiritual life. What has God been doing in your heart? When you are listening to others, realize they are sharing the “pearls of the kingdom” with you. You are treading on holy ground. Be respectful of this blessing.

Speak and listen with all of your heart.

Learn about overcoming shame.
Learn about the limits of self-revelation.
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Reframe Your Life From Ugly To Beautiful

Reframe Your Life From Ugly To Beautiful

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Reading time: 4 minutes

An ugly frame can detract from an otherwise beautiful picture. If so, it makes sense to reframe the picture.

Why do pictures have frames? A good frame enhances the picture by making sure it’s presented in the best possible way. The best frame will help a viewer see the picture at its fullest potential.

What frames your life? What do you use to make sense of it? An erroneous belief system can cancel out a person’s otherwise healthy life. If you don’t have anything in particular to guide you in life, there’s a better chance than not that drift away from God’s intentions.

Jesus is the master reframer of life.

When to Reframe the Present with the Future

How do Christians benefit from knowing God? Are there benefits in the short-term and long-term, only one, or neither? As Christians, we might know the fact of eternal life (a long-term benefit) but struggle to realize the present-day benefits. Short-term benefits are unpredictable. God acts to accomplish His purposes, which might or might not include what will make your life easier.

Let’s look at the story of Lazarus as an example.

Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. Yet even now I know that God will do anything you ask.” Jesus told her, “Your brother will live again!” Martha answered, “I know that he will be raised to life on the last day, when all the dead are raised.”

Jesus then said, “I am the one who raises the dead to life! Everyone who has faith in me will live, even if they die. And everyone who lives because of faith in me will never really die. Do you believe this?” “Yes, Lord!” she replied. “I believe that you are Christ, the Son of God. You are the one we hoped would come into the world.”

John 11:21-27 CEV

Martha knew enough about Jesus to know He can do great things and God will answer all He asks. But she assumed that Jesus was being positive only about the future, not the present. She understood death to be irreversible. If Jesus had decided to not resurrect Lazarus, the lesson would be that when God does not correct a wrong or a loss, the future hope we have is a beautiful reframe for the present.

When to Reframe the Future with the Present

Jesus could see more than Martha. He used His understanding to gently reframe the situation for Martha. That’s the way it is for all of us. God sees more. He’ll always see more than we do. That’s why it’s good for us to believe Him and trust Him.

When Jesus saw that Mary and the people with her were crying, he was terribly upset and asked, “Where have you put his body?” They replied, “Lord, come and you will see.” Jesus started crying, and the people said, “See how much he loved Lazarus.”

John 11:33-35 CEV

Isn’t it amazing how much Jesus connects with the people in His life? He knows what God wants. He knows He’s going to resurrect Lazarus. And, He’s so fully in tune with how Mary and Martha feel about their brother that He weeps with them. This time God’s will leads to a better present for the friends of Lazarus. God is glorified.

Jesus looked up toward heaven and prayed, “Father, I thank you for answering my prayer. I know that you always answer my prayers. But I said this, so that the people here would believe that you sent me.” When Jesus had finished praying, he shouted, “Lazarus, come out!” The man who had been dead came out.

John 11:41-44 CEV

Jesus chooses to perform a miracle to demonstrate the truth that He transcends death because He is life. When God chooses to intervene in your life it’s also to help you see the truth. It’s okay to receive His encouragement. You can allow a positive experience to increase your faith that God is good and eternal life is real.

What do you have in your life that would benefit from being reframed? Share it with Jesus; tell Him your concerns. Tell Him how much faith you have in Him. Then, look for Jesus to frame your life in a way that goes beyond your expectations.

Give your life situation over to God. Ask Him to reframe you with Him and His truth. Be ready for a positive interpretation that exceeds your best interpretation. God loves you more than you realize.

Learn more about life perspectives.
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Last updated June 11, 2023

4 Steps To A Confident Identity

4 Steps To A Confident Identity

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Confidence can be elusive but your identity is the key to finding it. Overshoot and you become proud or arrogant. Undershoot and you carry a heavy burden of discouragement. It’s possible to be confident and humble at the same time. It all depends on how you orient your life: where you find your identity.

Becoming confident takes time. You can develop it as you experience life when considering God as your audience of one. You can become your ideal self–the best version of you that you are pleased with.

Your ideal self is precisely who God means for you to be. You can’t know your ideal self instantaneously. Your identity is God’s greatest gift to you only if you open it up and discover who you are.

I love the following quote, which I first discovered through Darlene Harris while planning an article for her site, andherestorethmysoulproject.org.

Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.

St. Catherine of Siena

This means you have a significant destiny to fulfill by being your ideal self. If you knew who God meant for you to be you wouldn’t want to be anyone else.

To become your ideal self you must journey through four developmental stages. Each stage has a primary focus: caregiver, creation, crisis, and finally Christ. Before you can reach your full potential in one stage, you must complete the challenge of the previous stage. You can work on multiple stages at a time, but incomplete work limits your progress.

1. Caregiver-Focused Identity

You start life dependent on your primary caregivers. You don’t have anything to contribute to others. Your only real job is to learn how to receive from others. Can you receive from others without becoming unnecessarily dependent on them? You can receive and grow at the same time. You receive so you can grow.

2. Creation-Focused Identity

You develop competency and skill by interacting with the external world. At first, you learn to crawl, walk, and run. You learn who you are based on who you connect with the world beyond your body. If you do this well, you contribute to others through the work of your hands. If you don’t, you can become dependent on creation, instead of your creator, to sustain a positive outlook on life.

3. Crisis-Focused Identity

At some point in your life, you face a crisis. A crisis tests your internalized growth or identity. It forces you to clarify your worldview and specifically your Godview. Will you choose to:

  1. Avoid God and return to creation to meet your needs?
  2. Attempt to move Against God and redefine creation to meet your needs?
  3. Ally with God and learn how to let God meet your needs?

If you reject God in some way (option 1 or 2), you’ll likely choose some other ally to depend on (creation or caregivers) as if they were God. You’re vulnerable to developing an addiction because you remain crisis focused instead of Christ-focused. You struggle to accept a good God in a world where you’ve experienced evil.

4. Christ-Focused Identity

You can become a Christian at any of the four steps along the way to identity maturity. However, if you’re not a Christian by the time you reach stage three, the process of resolving your crisis by allying with God and becoming a Christian allows you to enter stage four.

In this final state, you’re sold out on becoming exactly who God made you to be. You desire to align yourself with God’s reality, not a reality you make up. You’re determined to remove any false ideas concerning who you are.

Can you feel the burning in your heart to become all that God made you to be? Are you stuck at any stage in particular? God has all His resources ready to help you become who He made you to be. Then you can set the world on fire. The material in this post comes from my book To Identity and Beyond.

Read more about identity.
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Blame And Defensiveness Exposed

Blame And Defensiveness Exposed

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Reading time: 4 minutes

Who do you blame for life’s problems? How easy is it to identify the source of a problem? What do you blame? When? Why? How often? You might accuse others or you might condemn yourself of some wrongdoing.

Blaming shifts the focus of responsibility. While this tactic might be used for good purposes, I am writing about blame when it is activated for purely selfish purposes.

Blame is Possible Because of a Standard of Behavior

In order to accuse someone of wrongdoing, there must first be some standard in mind, otherwise, the complaint makes no sense. But a blaming statement is meant to carry the weight of authority behind it.

  1. You cut me off in traffic.
  2. You punched me in the face.
  3. You called me names to denounce my worth.
  4. You took the last cookie.
  5. You went to bed without saying goodnight.
  6. You spend too much time with your friends, your computer, your work, your family.
  7. You don’t want to understand me.

What do all of these have in common? They speak of an expectation for behavior, for someone else’s behavior. They could be statements of fact, but they could also be spoken with an edge of condemnation.

We desire to be treated in a way that meets our emotional needs. We also desire to be capable of treating others well. But others fall short and so do we. How well do you love? How badly do you want to love well? What does it mean to you when others love you well?

Blame can be an attack and so blame-shifting is a natural counter-attack. Consider these responses to the above accusations:

  1. You drive too slowly.
  2. You provoked me by continuing to nag.
  3. You don’t understand what I’ve been through.
  4. You never claimed it for your own.
  5. I was too tired to think.
  6. You’re trying to control me.
  7. You’re impossible to understand.

As you can see, the argument is not over whether a standard even exists. It is over the extenuating circumstances, the technicalities of its fulfillment. No one is eager to admit failing to meet the standard. No one wants to feel inadequate to meet the standard.

Blame is Possible Because We Have a Choice

God has standards or laws for many aspects of His creation. Gravity is a law or standard of expected behavior. When a ball is dropped, it falls to the ground. The ball doesn’t have a choice. Gravity would act upon the ball even if the ball could desire to remain suspended in the air.

What about the standards that God has for us? The Bible speaks of the law.

Why, then, was the law given? It was given alongside the promise to show people their sins.

Let me put it another way. The law was our guardian until Christ came; it protected us until we could be made right with God through faith. And now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian.

Galatians 3:19a,24,25

We no longer need the law as a guardian because we have God Himself as our example of love and our teacher of love. The standard causes us to depend on God to meet the standard. We have the option to sin. We can act against God’s Spirit. We can deviate from His law of behavior.

Unlike the law of gravity that acts upon us involuntarily, God does not forcefully ensure that we love when we don’t want to, or can’t. The law acts upon us from the outside, but God acts from the inside with our cooperation.

When we are faced with our inadequacy to fulfill the law, the natural, sinful response is to minimize the law. My inability to meet your expectations is not my fault. Your standards are too high. You sabotaged my ability to meet them. It’s your fault. You are to blame. The defensive response can seem involuntary because it can come so quickly.

Because we cannot escape from God’s standard, we have only these options to manage God’s standard:

  1. Ignore it (pretend it doesn’t exist).
  2. Downplay it (it exists, but can’t possibly be taken seriously).
  3. Admit falling short but stubbornly hold to independence, living with condemnation (refusing God’s help through Jesus).
  4. Admit falling short but fully depend on God’s help to meet the standard.

The first three will illicit some form of blaming. But when we depend upon God, we no longer have a need for blaming or defensiveness.

Read more about resolving conflict.
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